First Ride of 2010 at Bigmark's

So we were out again for the first time in 2010 and the first time since my little sleep in the forest on Monday and to be honest I was not sure if I would make the first couple of lanes as I was still struggling with a painful chest and a dose of man flu but the boys were up for it and Gaz Jon & Stu had not been to mine for quite a while so rather than cancelling and letting them down I decided to dose myself up on pain killers and give it a go.

The day started as always with bacon butties and steaming hot mugs of tea. The run list was Me, Steve (Trebble99), Juz (Caseboy101), Gaz (Pec Gaz), Jon (Hugoagogo), Andrew (Brompton92), Stuart (Stuj).

It was too cold for Kev, Nik had a dose of manflu, Mag had tickets for the Boro match and Gaz’s mate Cuzza who got in as first reserve decided he would rather sell his bike than bring it for a ride it at Bigmarks.

The boys got changed in my garage and we set off on the same route as last week.

We took the nearest lane through a local farm rather than trying to get up some of the side roads and rode in the open field verges bordering the road in the forest the fire roads were not quite as lethal as last week although still held few surprises if you were not careful.

We rode the muddy lanes in the forest that we did last week although I elected to miss out one of the climbs due to not being 100% and Steve & Andrew decided to keep me company whilst the over boys did the climb up and back down again.

L to R Andrew Juz, Jon, Stu, Steve & Gaz.

After this we set off along towards the off camber climb but Jon picked a bad line and this was the result.

At the now famous climb Stu demonstrated his feet up trials style with his young apprentice Juz following the master and then Gaz did an impression of me riding the hill.Stu

Juz

Gaz

We set off to the good, the bad and the ugly via Backlays farm and I had a go on Andrew’s bike to try out his Rekluse on the climb, which it glided up no problems. I stopped halfway along to swap bikes back and once we got through the farm the icy fire roads bit Stu and then Gaz on the arse in quick succession.

Onto the fire road from Broxa, which brought us to the decent down to Harwood Dale which was proper slippy and very wet and muddy and only Steve had a go at riding back up.

Steve

The boys took the side route into “The Ugly” but I elected to ride round and meet them on the top fire road as I knew if I got it wrong in there and had to start rarving and chewing the bike I would be fooked in no time as my chest was still hurting like fook.

It gave me the chance to take some scenic pictures as I waited for them to emerge but by the time I could here the engines coming it was snowing like fook and my bike looked like a snowman but this was nothing to how the boys looked when they finally reached the lane end.

Sixdays

Juz

Stu

We all rode “The Bad” and I managed to accidentally roost Andrew demonstrating my famous bog crossing style at my favourite section much to the amusement of Juz.

At the end of the lane we agreed it was time to head for home as the weather was closing in and the side roads were getting a further good covering of snow.

I rode the boys round the side roads to the lane in to the climb up to Reasty Bank from the East and again decided that I would ride round and meet them at the top which seemed to be a good decision as a few of the boys had a bit of a healthy glow on reaching the top.

A steady run over the slippy fire road to Broxa and then one final lane up through Wrench Green got us all back to mine in one piece.

Mrs Bigmark had done us proud again with steak pies from Morrison’s and muffins and she even made the brew’s today.

By the time the tea was ready and the pies had been removed from the oven, by the wife, the boys were just about changed and were allowed into the sanctuary of my kitchen to warm up.

This is when I made my first mistake of the day by getting the hosepipe out to let Andrew “wash the salt off his bike” as by the time the salt washing was finished 4 bikes stood shinning on my street which now looked more like a green lane in Harwood Dale than a quiet residential street. I am expecting a visit from the neighbours anytime with a signed petition requesting that I fook off somewhere else.:rolleyes:

Mrs Bigmark says I have to install a coin/note meter on the hosepipe/jetwash to make some money for her new kitchen, which I will not be allowed in, as my garage looks like a mud bomb went off in it and the blast covered my street in mud.:eek::redface:

All in all a top day again and at least this week we called it quits before it had chance to go tits and bite us all on the arse.

Thanks to Andrew, Stu, Steve, Juz, Gaz & Jon for a top day out and to the sick list and no shows in the words of our good friend Lee ( KTMBrock) you missed “the best days riding ever and Bigmark even managed to stay conscious all day”